BC needs urgent rescue in Ontario

[AgilityPup]

Personally, I think that any situation he could possibly be in would be better than the one he's in now.

I'd be iffy to take him to a doggy day care, myself, but really, from what I've heard, it's not hard to keep him from other dogs in that situation, and as long as you have a group of people willing to understand that YES, there are times when he bites seemingly unprovoked, and YES there is a chance you will be bitten, but NO, bites aren't a huge deal in this case.

I really wish there were more I could do for this boy. I hope that if one of the chazzers ends up with him that he's kept so I can watch him grow. I'm really drawn to this boy, despite his issues, but I just can't swing another dog right now, and I don't know how good it would be for him to be in a house with 5 other dogs, where there's plenty of random things (sticks, rocks, horse poop, dog poop, the odd toy here and there) for him to guard.

ETA: A good point brought up that I hadn't thought of is the commotion. Dogs coming in, dogs going out, barking, whining... yeah. That would be enough to make even Psyche uncomfortable in a doggy day care.

 

[Jules]

I agree very strongly with Lizmo. This sounds to me like a dog with a lot of anxiety and insecurity, and a dog who has shown that he is willing to bite people. Multiple bites in one biting event is technically a Level 4 bite, and that's serious stuff. Yes, it was triggered by the owner doing something she shouldn't have, but it's still not something to be ignored.

Even in the best daycare, there's going to be more commotion than I think this dog should be asked to deal with right now. He needs somewhere calm to settle. Exercise is important, but I don't think it's the most important thing for this dog. He's had a lot of stress in his life, is facing more, and a daycare situation is going to add yet more. I think that's setting him up to fail, and this dog really really needs to be protected from failing again.

You also don't really know what's going to trigger him to bite. Resources, yes, but not just resources. What if someone reaches down to pet him and he takes it the wrong way and nails them?

Down the road once you know him better, once he's had time to settle in, adjust, relax- fabulous. But right away? No.

:hail:

I agree with elegy and lizmo.

 

[britishbandit]

Excellent points everyone, and yes, I understand everyone's concerns. I want Charlie to find a better home of course, but as you can see, I'm not hiding anything about his behavior. Taking him in is a decision not to be taken lightly, and I'm conveying everything I'm being told, so people know what they'll be dealing with/facing with him.

And I completely agree that it isn't just exercise he needs, he does need the mental stimulation too, and needs to be somewhere where he can actually interact with the family/person he lives with. I don't think any dog would display good behavior being kept in an x-pen all the time when it's in the house.

I think that's part of the resource guarding issue. Because he was kept in that pen with his toys/food on a permanent basis and not allowed loose in the house, I believe he associates the pen and everything in it as things that are his and that he has to guard.

Another thing. My friend is an awesome person, but not dog savvy at all. I remember her coming over here before she got Charlie, when my dogs had only met her a few times before. Even PJ and Tysa acted wary/cautious of her. It's hard to explain but her movements towards dogs are edgy. Kind of stiff/hesitant, even submissive and PJ and Tysa definitely picked up on that. More so PJ. He even growled at her when she went to rub his belly, and that's not like him at all. He LOVES belly rubs, from anyone, even people he's never met before. And it wasn't a "happy growl", he was not comfortable with her at all. I had to ask her to back away from him, she couldn't tell the difference between that growl and the "happy growl" he'd previously displayed while playing tug with her. So I can certainly understand why she thought Charlie's bite warnings were subtle. My buddy is definitely more a cat person......she's awesome with them. She seems to draw them to her without her having to do anything at all. She actually volunteers at a cat rescue.

Since milo's mommy has shown interest and believes he can be worked with, I've given my friend the info to get in touch so questions can be answered faster without me having to relay the info back and fourth. Plus I don't want to leave anything out. I'm trying to ask her these questions over the phone and keep marking down point form trying to remember it all to type out here.

Milo's mommy - I believe she is waiting to email you until she hears back from the woman who currently has him. My friend received word yesterday that Charlie was undergoing a 4 hour behavioral evaluation with a trainer last night.

 

[milos_mommy]

I absolutely don't think this dog belongs in a day care setting the day he's re-homed, or a few days or two weeks later. But I think after a couple of weeks of evaluation and desensitizing, he stands a strong chance of thriving in that kind of environment. Like I said, my co-workers are fairly dog-savvy and no one is going to go reach down and try to pet him without letting him approach them. I think after a month (in which I'm off school and will have ample time outside of work to spend time with him) I will be able be to tell if he's at risk for biting outside of resource guarding or after being screamed at, kicked, and then reached for. If I decide this dog doesn't belong in day care, I'll have a month to work with him heavily and look for a 2nd home.

After considering it, if I can not bring this dog to work with me eventually, I think I'm definitely a better home for him than he is in now, at least temporarily. I have a question for those more experienced with border collie puppies, I'm going to share the potential schedule if I can not bring the dog to work, and see what you think:

Every day of the week the dog would get a half hour leashed walk OR off leash playtime in the courtyard (about 25 X 25 feet) in the morning.
He'd get breakfast and a short (maybe 10 min) basic training session, and we'd work on higher-value trades or "drop it" with a low-value item for a little bit.
He would then be crated for 2 hours 4x week and 5 hrs on monday.

Monday would be the longest time he'd be in a crate, but then except for a 1.5 hr night class, I'd have the rest of the day to spend with him. We'd probably do more work on trades and obedience, and then go to the park for playtime on a long line. There are also wooded areas he could explore, rocks to climb on, etc. I'd also bring him to the bank, pet store, etc.

Tues and Thurs are days I work. On those days he'd get another 1 hr of exercise/training (a walk or courtyard time, we could even do 30 mins of on leash walk and 30 mins of long line park time), but then back in the crate for 5 hrs until I get home.

I usually only work one day on the weekend, but those shifts are longer, usually 7 hours. I'd be able to come home and give him a 15 minutes potty break, though. The rest of the weekend I would dedicate a couple of hours to exercise and training.

It's not the ideal situation where I would choose to bring a border collie puppy into, but I do think it's better than where he is now and being with me for a few months wouldn't set him back or increase his problems.

I have more questions about the level of stimulation this dog has been exposed to, how socialized he is, and few more things, like whether he is an obsessive barker (which I could not take in an apartment) or if he's neutered (which I could always get done myself...but it'd be much easier if he was already). We're told he's good with other dogs, but I'm wondering how many other dogs he has actually been around...

 

[Jules]

I am going to go out and say it. I am all for rescuing dogs, I am all for giving dogs with issues a second chance in the right home. But there is a but at the end of this sentence.

I just get a bad feeling from this. Nothing personal, MM, but I don't know if a small apartment in the city is the right place for him. You said that you'll be off for a month- what happens after that month? Even if it is a month of working heavily with him.

The liability that comes along with a dog that bites multiple times in one incident, where we can't be sure that it is only resource guarding- it is just a situation too unpredictable. This is just MHO, of course.

I would gladly see this dog being rehabilitated in the right home, but.. but.

 

[milos_mommy]

I am going to go out and say it. I am all for rescuing dogs, I am all for giving dogs with issues a second chance in the right home. But there is a but at the end of this sentence.

I just get a bad feeling from this. Nothing personal, MM, but I don't know if a small apartment in the city is the right place for him. You said that you'll be off for a month- what happens after that month? Even if it is a month of working heavily with him.

The liability that comes along with a dog that bites multiple times in one incident, where we can't be sure that it is only resource guarding- it is just a situation too unpredictable. This is just MHO, of course.

I would gladly see this dog being rehabilitated in the right home, but.. but.

Worse case scenario after a month is; (aside from the worse case scenario being this dog actually having some sort of rage syndrome or mental instability or being dangerous to work with) when I go back to school, is that he's crated up to 7 hours a day and is only getting about twice as much exercise and mental stimulation and infinitely more training than he's getting now, and will be worked with slowly until I find a forever home I'm comfortable placing him in.

Best case scenario is that this dog's biggest problem is resource guarding and lack of exercise, and after a month I feel comfortable taking him to work with me and he improves drastically, which I do think is very possible.

I am well aware of the liability of taking on a dog that has a bite history. I am very confident I can prevent this dog from biting anyone in the future. I can certainly prevent him from biting anyone while he is in my care and if I have any doubt about his ability to succeed in a new home, he won't be sent to one.

 

[elegy]

as long as you have a group of people willing to understand that YES, there are times when he bites seemingly unprovoked, and YES there is a chance you will be bitten, but NO, bites aren't a huge deal in this case.

i think this is a tremendously dangerous mindset to have. intentional bites are never not a big deal, imo, and many of the dogs who end up on the evening news are dogs who have a history of bites that had been considered "not a huge deal" in the past.

in all honesty, mm, i'd be more concerned about how many people are in/out of your apartment and the amount of control you'd have over his environment than how much exercise or crate time he'll get.

part of me wants to throw my hat in the ring and offer to work with this dog, but... like jules said.... but

 

[AgilityPup]

i think this is a tremendously dangerous mindset to have. intentional bites are never not a big deal, imo, and many of the dogs who end up on the evening news are dogs who have a history of bites that had been considered "not a huge deal" in the past.

in all honesty, mm, i'd be more concerned about how many people are in/out of your apartment and the amount of control you'd have over his environment than how much exercise or crate time he'll get.

part of me wants to throw my hat in the ring and offer to work with this dog, but... like jules said.... but

I really need to work on expressing what I mean by that. It's hard for me to explain, but I understand why some people don't agree with me. In our house, if a dog fight occurs and you get bitten, you don't dwell on "OH MY GOD, I GOT BIT!" you say "Okay, I was bitten. Time to figure out a rotation or a plan to prevent a fight again so that I don't get bitten again." Bites are a big deal, but we don't see them as a big deal to PEOPLE, but more as a big deal in that something needs to be changed with THE DOG and its routine to prevent it from happening again.

If a dog like Charlie bit one of us, we wouldn't be panicked thinking that 'oh my god, he bit me, he bit me." it would be a "okay, we really need to work on something to prevent that from happening again, more training, more stimulation, etc. etc."

So they are a big deal for the DOG meaning the dog needs something that we weren't giving, or something needs to change, but not a big deal for the PEOPLE because we know that it wasn't the dogs fault entirely, we need to do something about it.

Get what I'm saying? I don't in ANY WAY mean to say that a dog can bite me several times and I'm just like "okay, it's all good. No biggie." hell, a dog can't even bite me ONCE and get away with that. No. A dog bites me and I say "Well, whoops, I got bit, but I'll live. It's time to change or do something about the dog to prevent it from happening again."

Sorry for any confusion.

 

[milos_mommy]

I kind of understand what you're trying to say, Shay, but I think if the dog bites someone else it's a lot different than the dog biting it's owner or handler.

The only people who come in and out of my apartment are my roommate and Zach and I. No, I can't 100% control this dog's environment the way I could if I was in the middle of nowhere with a huge yard where we'd never ever run into anyone else. But this dog is already from a city subdivision, it's not like he isn't used to people and noises and traffic. I think people who aren't from NYC picture it as one giant, bustling Times Square or something...I live in a small, quiet building in a quiet neighborhood. I'm not going to be walking this dog past masses of people on the streets or through huge crowds.

 

[Romy]

The 4th bite was the bad one. There had just been an argument over Charlie (he was barking in his x-pen and my friends parents had flipped out about it screaming at her to shut him up). She went over and tried to work on some clicker training with him to give him some stimulation hoping it would calm him down and tried to put him into the "relaxed position" her trainer had told her about. Back turned to her, she walked up behind him and he turned and bit. This time he bit twice, not just once. The one bite did draw blood and was quite deep, though she didn't receive stitches for it.

He has only bit my friend, and nipped twice at one of the trainers during a session.

I should also mention that unaware to my friend of the consequences of it, she has pinned him down at least two of the times he bit her. I'm not sure if it was her way/idea of trying to establish dominance or if it was simply all she could think to do after being bit. Maybe to prevent him biting her a second time. Obviously it hasn't helped matters.

The part in bold stood out to me. What exactly is this "relaxed position"? Is it the "calm submissive" alpha roll Cesar Milan always pulls? Because I could see something like that provoking a defensive bite in an insecure dog.

 

[*blackrose]

The part in bold stood out to me. What exactly is this "relaxed position"? Is it the "calm submissive" alpha roll Cesar Milan always pulls? Because I could see something like that provoking a defensive bite in an insecure dog.

That is what I was thinking, too.

Really, this dog sounds a LOT like Chloe. Like, I think he is her long lost brother from another lineage. When I was working Chloe through her issues, I can tell you right now that manipulating her into a down position would have caused her to bite me, no matter how gentle I was trying to be. Crap, it wasn't even that long ago she wouldn't even do a roll over trick for me because she didn't want to expose her belly. She's great about it now (and will roll over in public! ) and I can mold her into whatever position I want, but as a pup? Heck no.

Chloe also never gave any obvious warnings (and still doesn't). I can tell she is starting to feel uncomfortable just by the way she sets her eyes or holds her mouth. Sometimes that is all the warning you get before she snaps. It took the rest of my family FOREVER to realize that a dog does not have to growl or show its teeth to show that is uncomfortable and ready to bite. Now thankfully they can read her fairly well, and we've avoided many awkward situations because of that. I can see how someone who isn't dog savvy might not be reading Charlie well enough to know when he is starting to feel uncomfortable. If Chloe's subtle signals weren't heard and understood and she was constantly being "ignored", I wouldn't be suprised if she escalated to a full on bite just like Charlie did.

Charlie's predicament is the exact same situation I think Chloe would have ended up in had she not been adopted by me (or someone similarlly dog savvy). In the hands of someone with little to no experience, she would have ended up biting someone - badly - and would have probably been euthanized.

I hope everything works out for everyone envolved. I'm not sorry for Chloe being around (well, some days....), and I think Charlie deserves a fighting chance, too.

 

[britishbandit]

The part in bold stood out to me. What exactly is this "relaxed position"? Is it the "calm submissive" alpha roll Cesar Milan always pulls? Because I could see something like that provoking a defensive bite in an insecure dog.

I have no idea what that is, but it wouldn't surprise me if it entails the alpha roll. Since she has mentioned "pinning" him down.

 

[milos_mommy]

Update (though it's kind of unclear):

Charlie was evaluated last night by Michigan Border Collie Rescue. I do not know if this evaluation was in order to see if they could take him in, or just to evaluate his problems. His original owner does not seem to be in clear communication with his 2nd foster home and I'm unclear about whether or not he is still with his 2nd foster mom or in a rescue.

Does anyone know anything about Michigan Border Collie Rescue? Are they qualified to give a dog a behavior evaluation and will they be responsible while giving him a fair chance? Or are they just going to set this dog up to fail and label him as unfixable, or toss him into a home where he doesn't belong so he can end up a statistic?

 

[RD]

I don't know anything about that BC rescue.

In addition to a lack of exercise, I would guess it's one of two things.

1. The dog's owner never fully had his trust, but was acting as if she did.

2. The dog is extremely sensitive to posturing and has a hair trigger for his bite response.

If it was #1, I think the dog is a normal border collie. I'd expect my own dog to bite if she was being man-handled by someone she wasn't fully comfortable with.

If it was #2... bleh. I have run into a lot of BCs like that, they're so tightly wound that their primary reaction to a lot of situations is to bite. I don't know what I'd do with a dog like that, long-term. Frankly it does concern me to hear about serious bites coming from a 9 month old puppy border collie, but if it's just resource guarding, resource guarding isn't impossible to fix.

That being said, I do agree with Elegy and Lizmo. That isn't a dog that I would take in and immediately introduce to dog parks and daycare situations. A dog that bites his owner will just as readily bite a stranger, and you can't predict the kind of situations he'll get into in a public setting like that.

MM/Zhucca, if either of you take him I wish you the best of luck! He is a handsome boy and my gosh does he ever look like Steve...

 

[milos_mommy]

There has been a very strange change of events.

I'm not sure how Charlie's original owner knows the foster home she put him into, but I know she was having difficultly getting in touch with her recently.

Apparently, the dog's breeder is taking him back as it's in her contract, although I question her ability to handle him. The original owner has told me she has been receiving threatening messages on facebook by the breeder and foster home for causing Charlie's problems. She says she doesn't feel comfortable or safe contacting them further because of the harassment.

I'm not really sure what else I can do...I can ask for the foster mother's email address, but I doubt she'll be willing to give it to me. I imagine the breeder is just going to take this dog back and put him down.

 

[AgilityPup]

Do we know the breeder? Perhaps the breeder will take him back and actually work with him. I hope so.

 

[milos_mommy]

The breeder is taking him back, but she doesn't want to, as far as I know. It's in the contract that she'll take the dog back, which sounds reputable to me. All I know is her name is Vickie and she's in Windsor, Ontario. I don't think she shows or competes with her dogs, so she may be really hard to find.

I ask for the breeder's contact information, but the first owner said the breeder is sending her death threats over facebook and she's frightened to contact her further herself, so I doubt I'll get it.

 

[skittledoo]

I hope this breeder is taking him back to work with him and not to just put him down. It seems to me like this is a situation that can be sorted out if he's in the right home with someone who is a lot more dog savvy... I agree that dog parks are not a good idea right now and I also don't really think a dog daycare is a good idea either.

Bamm doesn't really snap rarely but he WILL give warning signs if he's uncomfortable with something or feels threatened in any way. I'm always having to tell people if they're making my dog nervous because a lot of people just can't read their body language, I think in part because they don't take the time to really learn how a dog expresses things. Bamm has bitten someone pretty good a couple times, but those were mainly in situations where he was trying to protect me (once when a stranger tried to grab me in a bad neighborhood and the other time when a roommate of mine was being a jerk and decided to hit me with a belt quite a few times). The situation with my roommate was a bad one because he ended up running around telling everyone my dog attacked him and was aggressive and when I tried to explain to them what really happened I'd get the, "your dog shouldn't bite anyone for ANY reason even if it IS to protect you."

I definitely feel with Charlie's situation that it's a matter of lack of exercise, lack of trust and relationship building, lack of the owner's knowledge in understanding dog behavior and if she was indeed did pin this dog down in any way or try to alpha roll him or any other of those training techniques then that's probably playing a HUGE part in why he's biting.

I just hope for Charlie's sake that he ends up in someone's hands who might be able to truly help him. He deserves at least that much and if helping him is not successful and it ends up being more of a mental imbalance with him (which I don't think is the likely problem in this case) then at least someone will have given him and honest chance.

 

[skittledoo]

MM- definitely try to get the breeder's contact info from her. She needs to understand that it's not HER that would be contacting the breeder, it's YOU who would be... and if this breeder didn't really want to take him back but did anyway it seems to me that this breeder might not try to get him the help he needs... but I could just be assuming. Anyways... hope you're able to contact her. Have you tried googling for her yet?

 

[milos_mommy]

She wouldn't give me the contact info but did give me the breeder's full name I found her email via google and sent an email, told her I didn't know the original owner but had heard about Charlie through the grapevine and would like to work with him.

Apparently the original owner filed a police report and restraining order against the breeder so....I'm thinking she's a real crazy, but who knows. I'm hoping I'll hear back soon.